


Bereave

by PurelyRed



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: F/M, How Nagini came to be so loyal to Voldemort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-26
Updated: 2018-11-26
Packaged: 2019-08-29 19:28:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16750201
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PurelyRed/pseuds/PurelyRed
Summary: The story of why Nagini ends up following Voldemort. Prompt filler after watching Crimes of Grindelwald.





	Bereave

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: In honour of the answer that @bounding-heart replied to wanting a fic of Nagini being tragically drawn to damaged orphan Tom in the same way she was drawn to Credence.
> 
> Hopefully, it hits all the right nails and satisfies every criteria xD.

It’s been too long.

Far too long, that no one has understood her.

She stares at the tiny boy, handsome but oddly calm, the surprise only momentarily showing in his intelligent eyes as he tilts his head, glancing back at her.

There’s a beat of silence as her tongue flickers, and they both assess each other through their dark eyes. A hope that she knows could very well destroy her rises in her chest as the deadened leaves in the cave rustled under her belly.

_Had he just understood her?_

She hisses delicately in his direction, watching warily as his eyes brightened.

“You’re different too, aren’t you?”There’s a hunger that’s so familiar in his eyes. The desperation and yearning of finding himself to be something more than just what he currently was sending a pang into her deadened heart, coinciding with the fading image of another male, long ago. Fragile and broken, handsome and desperate for recognition.

She hisses in response, her body coiling around his right arm, her head rising to rest against his shoulder, her tongue flickering almost comfortingly as she hissed against his ear.

_Yes._

He hears her, and brightens at her response as she preens.

It’s been too long that she’s managed to make someone feel better in ways that she could no longer respond in. It reminds her of the time that she used to be able to move on two feet, to comfort someone with words other than hissing.

He leaves much earlier than she’d like him to, but returns the next day with peace offerings.

Dead rats and mice, leftover foods from the table.

She prefers the leftover foods as compared to the rats and mice, her fading memory of delicious human food a more distinct memory than all others. There was nothing more than she missed than being able to consume warm food, well cooked and seasoned.

“You almost remind me of a human.”The boy reaches over to stroke the top of her head as she eats, voice a soft whisper. “And you’re beautiful.” She hisses her pleasure in response, and bumps her head against the palm of his very hand, a smile creasing in her heart as a peal of laughter falls from the lonely boy’s lips.

They spend their days in passing just like that, with him sneaking into the cave that she found refuge in every evening, bringing with him bulging pockets of food and game.

He’s playing and levitating fragments of stones in the air when the Muggle children find him, and the first thing he does is to hide her behind a pillar of stone.

“Stay here.”Affection is almost clear in his voice as he rubs his hand over her head. “I’ll chase them away. The adults will kill you if they know that you’re here.”His handsome face slips into a frozen mask of indifference, eyes darkened with hate and malice, and she all but curls against him, unsettled.

_Don’t go._

The plea is clear in her hidden voice, the strong wrap of her body around his tiny hand.

He smiles lightly, prying his hand lose from her restricting body and steps into the light.

_Credence!_

A wave of her strongest human memory, riddled with pain and rife with heartbreak bursts into the forefront of her mind.

_He knows where you’re from, not who you are!_

_Please!_

The handsome but broken male in her memories glances back at her, torn but desperate, reluctant affection in the contours of his face as he drinks in her features.

_Credence!_

His hand slips from her own, and she screams in pure agony as he never returns.

…

His body is the only thing that they find amongst all the corpses of the dead in the aftermath of the battle.

“I’m..sorry..”It’s a word that she’s heard one too many times throughout the course of her life, and her hand shakes as his dark eyes stare back at her, blank and unseeing.

She hates the fact that the Mazoologist and his wife are standing behind her, watching her crumble and break over a corpse of a lover that she could never call her own.

Hates, the fact that all eyes are upon her with pity–an emotion she so detests, having been at the receiving end of it apart from amusement and greed throughout her life.

Credence is gone, and there’s nothing left in her cold heart that could ever let her fear again.

Everyone gathered around her flinches visibly as a broken keen rises from behind her parted lips, her face lifting to the bright clear sky as tears escape from her long lashed eyes.

It’s a cry that they all feel, broken and crushed, of hopelessness and endless despair.

Her body writhes, changes, deforms–and for once in her life, Nagini doesn’t care.

She hears the horrified cries wrenching through the air as she lets the beast in her consume her soul and body, feels the fading touch of Newt’s fingers as he reaches for her morphing hand, desperation on his face.

The beautiful dress that she dons falls to the ground as she slithers from its depths, her body curling upon the broken form of Credence almost protectively.

She is a beast.

 _Will be_ , a beast, from now on.

Her eyes turn towards Credence’s broken body as her tongue flickers, the last remnant of humanity that remained disappearing like the dying embers of a fire at its end.

There’s a beat of silence as they all wait, before she opens her mouth and swallows his body whole.

…

A cry of pain draws her back into the present, and her serpentine eyes flicker as she uncurls from behind the pillar, the sight of the boy that was kind to her sprawled on the ground, nose broken and bleeding as he lifts a hand to stop the endless blows.

The boy has magic. That much she knows.

So why isn’t he using it?

A long forgotten feeling of fear and anxiety rises in her chest as she watches the Muggle boy, twice his size, rain blow after blow on his fragile body.

_He doesn’t know how to use his magic that well yet._

The realization strikes her like a cruel blow.

He’d been levitating rocks and playing with magic around her for so long that she’d forgotten that he was supposed to be a Muggle orphan, without anyone to direct him or teach him how to better control his magic.

Rage is clear on his face, and from experience, she knows that his magic will lash out soon enough, to detrimental consequences.

But it’s taking too long. Far too long, and the flash of the shining pocket knife in one of the child’s hands sends a cold chill racing down her bones.

_No!_

She strikes before any of them knows what’s happening, her teeth snapping at the hand of the boy holding the knife, cleaving it from the rest of his body before he even delivers a blow.

Screams of horror, pain and confusion burst from the rest of the Muggle children, and she registers vaguely as she turns to attack the rest of the children that the boy has his hand out, hatred and venom clear in his eyes as the two main perpetrators of the group dangle by their necks in the air, their bodies flopping around like kites in the wind.

She curls her body around his, tugging him back with a light squeeze of her strong body from the endless wave of rage and anger.

His magic responds to his wish, violently throwing the two Muggle children against the ragged ends of the rock wall.

A sickening crack of bone echoes in the cave, and the boy breathes heavily as she curls around his body, her huge size dwarfing his tiny frame.

She bumps his head with her own, trying to comfort him as his chest heaves with emotion and rageful anger.

There was no point dwelling on it now.

The boy that reminded her so much of  _him–_ was safe now.

Her hissing wakes him from his exhilarated stupor, the realisation that he’d used his magic for offensive purposes and protection twisting his features into something enlightened but wild.

“Nagini, you need to leave.”He breathes lightly as she hisses angrily in response to his words, snapping her tail around his wrist in protest. “I will find you, I promise. But you need to leave before they find you.” Footsteps of heavy feet and the stench of fire and smoke fill their nostrils as he pries her tail off his right arm and shoulder. “Go!”

She finally leaves at his behest, watching his tiny back as he stares down the orange flames in human hands, and the accusing eyes of those out for his demise.

…

She doesn’t recognise him when he returns for her, her days of hunting and surviving in the Forest of Albania having turned her into a merciless hunter and beast. Separation was never something good for her, especially when she’d formed a bond so strong to another that she treasured.

Leaving him that day so many years ago had reminded her of the day she’d failed to retain Credence, the overwhelming sense of weakness and failure something she could no longer accept and take.

She needed to be stronger, faster, better–deadlier, so that she would never have to lose anyone ever again.

“Nagini.”It’s no surprise that he recognises her. After all, she’s stayed the same throughout all these years, waiting for his promise, waiting, and making herself better.

But she doesn’t recognise the handsome boy that she once knew in the wisp of someone else’s body that is apparently him, and rage fills her entire being as she slithers up the man’s side, mouth poised open to devour the cowering man on the other end that had seemingly defiled him.

The boy that she’s waited for no longer has a body, she learns gradually through his recounting of his story. A mishap of people who misunderstood him and desired to eliminate him.

He feels her righteous rage at his words, smiling as she curls around his right arm protectively, tongue flickering and teeth snapping as she hissed.

_How could they want to hurt someone as kind as him?_

Rage boils in her blood as she recalls his tiny but strong back, standing in the light of the flaming torches, and his insistence that she get away.

She’d failed at protecting him, once again.

The ire in the contours of her body is conveyed over to him, and he glides a finger down her back soothingly.

What is the point of growing stronger when she could never protect him?

He laughs at her question, amusement in his face and dark eyes sparkling with hidden intent.

“What do you think of seeking another body for me, Nagini?”He asks her gently, relaxing as she uncurls her body from his shoulder to glance at him. “A body that will never allow anyone to separate us ever again.” His words hit her deepest desire, stirring long lost feelings of hope and desperation. “We’d never be apart again.”

His dark eyes turn to her own, and she sees a shadow of redemption in his figure, of long lost hope and missed chances, and she curls tightly around his right arm, head slithering up to rest on his shoulder.

_Yes._

 

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: So the ending is set before the beginning of the Philosopher’s Stone. Voldemort has no body after killing Harry, and has just taken over Quirrell’s body when he meets Nagini again.
> 
> Also, there’s something that I included that draws parallels between Nagini and Credence and Nagini and Voldemort.
> 
> I wonder how many of you noticed that Nagini tends to attach herself to one side of Credence in the movie or in the promos.
> 
> Almost as though she’s kinda wrapping round his shoulder.
> 
> She does the same for Voldemort in the movies too, in her snake form.
> 
> She’s always at their left side or favours their left side to make an appearance. 
> 
> Its actually interchangeable for Credence, but in a way I used it as a way to express her imprinting her lost chances and image of Credence on him–her desire to be wanted, for companionship.
> 
> There’s another parallel too.
> 
> Remember when Credence walks through the flames to Grindelwald’s side?
> 
> I strengthened the parallel between Credence and young Voldemort by letting her see his back as she leaves, seeing him face fire just as Credence did when he chose to leave.
> 
> Did you see the parallels? 
> 
> xD
> 
> Also, before any of you whale on me for humanising Voldemort, remember that its from her point of view–when he returns, she’s never seen what he did before while he was outside in the world, and her only memory of him stops at the time when he protected her in his youth. So to her, he’s kind and cares for her, and its worse that his image is parallel to Credence, someone that she clearly cares for and loves.
> 
> Let me know what you guys think, and if you did see the parallels when you read this fic, before I revealed them in the A/Ns!
> 
> I’d love to read and hear all your comments hehe.
> 
> Again, this was posted on my tumblr first :3


End file.
